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Wednesday, June 20, 2012

You're Using Midwives???

It was February. I was about 4 months pregnant, and my obgyn wanted me to get my yearly pap smear.

Not a big deal, right?

I had been going to this group of doctors for over 2 years, and I had mainly seen the same one. I didn't dislike her. I didn't particularly like her, either. She was convenient, and since I didn't have any other plans, I just kept on going to her office after I got pregnant.

As she is part of a practice, and any number of doctors could be on call during the delivery, they started cycling me through so I could meet all of them.

When they told me it was time for my exciting yearly procedure, I didn't
really care. By that time in the pregnancy, I had been in those
stirrups at every visit, not to mention the ultrasounds. It would almost
be weird to go into an exam room and not drop my pants.

That day, I arrived 10 minutes early. 40 minutes later, they showed me to an exam room, and had me get undressed. 30 minutes after that, the doctor came in.

First off: he was young and attractive. This is not a good thing in a gynecologist. We're talking a tall, dark, handsome man who probably started his medical career on a soap opera, playing a devastatingly handsome neurosurgeon.

He walked in flirting with the nurse. He didn't introduce himself. He didn't even look at my face.

"Put your feet in the stirrups."

Abrupt, but ok. He was obviously very busy with the nurse. I'm sure he'd get around to me in a minute.

"Nice toenail polish."

Um, what? I didn't want him noticing things.

I said a hesitant thank you, but he had already turned back to his important conversation. About motorcycles.
Then he got to work. And it hurt. Like, really bad. I know things are more painful down there during pregnancy, but this guy would have hurt no matter what. It was the harshest, most abrupt pap smear in the history of pap smears. I swear he used a bristle scrub brush.

I winced in pain, and tried not to move. Not that he would have noticed. He had moved on to his favorite vacation spots, and had she ever been to the nude beaches in France?

(no, she hadn't. giggle giggle.)

It was over in about 2 minutes, and he stood up to go. As he was leaving the room, he looked at my eyes for the first time. He seemed slightly surprised that there was a person attached to my vagina.

"You'll probably bleed today."

And then he walked out of the room.

That was it. Three sentences.

"Put your feet in the stirrups."

"Nice toenail polish."

"You'll probably bleed today."

I still don't know his name.

And if he was the one on call, I'm sure the delivery of my baby would be just as abrupt and impersonal. Although if there was a hot nurse around, I'd probably get to hear him talk about his new car during the delivery.

When I got home, I went straight to my computer, and started looking into other options.

Well, hi. I'm Helena. I grew up on a blueberry farm in Western Michigan. My days were spent reading on the beach in the summer, and reading in my bedroom under a quilt in the chilly Michigan winter. I moved out to Utah to go to school, and to get away from my family. You know, typical angsty teenager stuff. While out there, I met this guy named Kurt, who was also from Michigan. But we were just friends.

Flash forward 9 years. We got married, and then we moved to Pittsburgh so he could go to Dental School. What can I say, the guy likes teeth. Now we have a little girl, a baby boy, two little turtles, and a whole new adventure ahead of us. Welcome to my life.